1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system and method for inputting location coordinates into the memory of at least one fixed position reference device in an ad-hoc wireless communications network. More particularly, the present invention relates to a system and method for computing the location of at least one fixed position reference device in a wireless communications network, such as an ad-hoc multihopping wireless communications network, and loading the computed geographic location coordinates into the memory of the at least one fixed position reference device, using a graphical mapping scheme.
2. Description of the Related Art
Wireless communication networks, such as mobile wireless telephone networks, have become increasingly prevalent over the past decade. In recent years, a type of mobile communications network known as an “ad-hoc” network has been developed. In this type of network, each mobile node is capable of operating as a base station or router for the other mobile nodes, thus eliminating the need for a fixed infrastructure of base stations. As can be appreciated by one skilled in the art, network nodes transmit and receive data packet communications in a multiplexed format, such as time-division multiple access (TDMA) format, code-division multiple access (CDMA) format, or frequency-division multiple access (FDMA) format, which enables a single transceiver at a first node to communicate simultaneously with several other nodes in its coverage area.
More sophisticated ad-hoc networks are also being developed which, in addition to enabling mobile nodes to communicate with each other as in a conventional ad-hoc network, further enable the mobile nodes to access a fixed network and thus communicate with other mobile nodes, such as those on the public switched telephone network (PSTN), and on other networks such as the Internet. Details of these advanced types of ad-hoc networks are described in U.S. Pat. No. 7,072,650 entitled “Ad Hoc Peer-to-Peer Mobile Radio Access System Interfaced to the PSTN and Cellular Networks”, issued on Jul. 4, 2006, in U.S. Pat. No. 6,873,839 entitled “Prioritized-Routing for an Ad-Hoc, Peer-to-Peer, Mobile Radio Access”, issued on Mar. 29, 2005, and in U.S. Pat. No. 6,807,165, the entire content of each being incorporated herein by reference.
In conventional wireless communications networks, and in ad-hoc wireless communications networks, it is often necessary or desirable for a user terminal to be capable of knowing or determining its geographic location. Different types of location determining services and techniques for wireless communications networks, in this regard, are described, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 6,728,545, the entire contents of which are incorporated herein by reference. Moreover, the '545 patent discloses a MEA™ wireless geo positioning system that is capable of determining the location of network nodes within a wireless network boundary using time of flight measurement and multilateration techniques. This geographic positioning system requires the use of several geographic reference routers to be used as position references, wherein the routers are located at fixed locations with known Geographic Information System (GIS) coordinates.
The geographical coordinates of references can be retrieved from GPS devices, in places where GOS Signals can be received, or are computed based on positions of the reference devices relative to other references with known geographical location. After the geographical positions are known, the coordinates are entered into the memory of the reference device using a user interface.
A need remains, however, for an improved method of inputting Geographical Information System (GIS) coordinates into fixed position reference devices in the context of determining the location of network nodes within a wireless communications network that substantially eliminate the drawbacks associated with existing systems and methods.